Friday, November 7, 2014

Six Very Special Shields part 4, Dzance's Guardian

Long time, no post! I think I may have burned myself out with the post-a-day pace a was setting. Well, I'm back, but I'm not making any promises for the remainder of the year. You see, I work for UPS and the next couple months pretty much suck.

After skipping ahead to fit in with the Halloween theme, I jump back into Dragon Magazine #89, and to be honest, I'm ready to finish this issue off. A few more shields to go, and a couple monsters that I was waiting for the Monster Manual before I posted. Today we get one of the shields, Dzance's Guardian.

Dzance’s Guardian

Unique magical shield

The ranger Dzance found this shield in a chest in the depths of Gauntulgrym, the Lost City; its origin is unknown, but it is thought to be of dwarven manufacture. Dzance's Journals tell us of the properties of this item. When he retired from adventuring to live in the Lady’s Court at Silverymoon, Dzance gave the Guardian to Belpir, a young knight of that city. The new owner forthwith went adventuring and has not been seen since. The fates of Belpir and of the Guardian are yet a mystery.

The Guardian is a “+0 shield”, magical in nature but conferring no additional armor class bonus. However, it has a special defensive power: when worn, it radiates an insubstantial magical energy field that envelops you (and only you) like an aura. Any magic missile directed at you from any direction - not just at the shield - will strike this field and be reflected unerringly straight back at the sender with no damage to you.

This field also absorbs all lightning damage, without harm to you. These attacks dissipate gradually and harmlessly if the shield is taken off, but if you can bring the shield into physical contact with a foe within 4 rounds of any such damage, the entire stored electrical energy of the field can be transmitted to the foe (a successful Constitution saving throw results in half damage). You will be made immediately aware of this storage and discharge power whenever the field intercepts electrical energy.

When this discharge is activated, there is a 30% chance that you and the shield (but not any companion creatures or foes unless direct, physical contact is present at the time) will be plane shifted to a random known plane of existence. This power will be unknown to the bearer until it actually occurs; identify and sage-lore will not reveal it.